


In a Handful of Dust

by raven_aorla



Series: Gotham Daemonverse [1]
Category: Gotham (TV), His Dark Materials - Philip Pullman
Genre: Ableism, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Daemons, Arkham, Daemon Feels, Daemon Prejudice, Daemon Separation, Daemon-Caused Ripple Effects, Daemons, F/M, Fusion, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Child Abuse, Implied/Referenced Domestic Violence, M/M, Mental Health Issues, Non-Graphic Violence, Witches
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-11-26
Updated: 2018-04-03
Packaged: 2019-02-06 22:24:45
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 10,217
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12827388
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/raven_aorla/pseuds/raven_aorla
Summary: A collection of interconnected stories. From the most recent chapter:ADDITIONAL NOTES: Alice’s brother Jervis Tetch’s daemon, Tegan (or Tee), is an edible dormouse (Glis glis), a species known for spending 6 months or more per year in torpor. He reportedly keeps her in a top hat he wears. Given the rarity of a person being able to stay energetic with a deeply sleeping (as opposed to dozing) daemon, this suggests Alice’s accounts of her brother’s hypnotic ‘powers’ might not be entirely fanciful. A fascinating prospect. Would it be possible to bring Jervis into our care the next time he attempts to visit his sister, rather than sending him away again?RESPONSE FROM THE COURT OF OWLS: Absolutely not, Strange.





	1. Jonathan and Phobos (1/2)

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Gold Dust](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12824994) by [irisbleufic](https://archiveofourown.org/users/irisbleufic/pseuds/irisbleufic). 



> There is shadow under this red rock,  
> (Come in under the shadow of this red rock),  
> And I will show you something different from either  
> Your shadow at morning striding behind you  
> Or your shadow at evening rising to meet you;  
> I will show you fear in a handful of dust. 
> 
> T.S. Eliot, _The Wasteland_

Phoebe hadn’t meant to fly away from her human so far and so fast. She’d just been in such abject terror, in such a need to get away from that _thing_ , that _boogeyman_ made of straw and fire as their father and his hedgehog-shaped Eurydice ran straight towards the policemen and their dog daemons, idiots, didn’t they know how much they were needed? The officer with the German Shepherd took the shot, his partner and his disproportionately small and yappy terrier running behind.

They’d always been so curious and a little jealous of their mother, hundreds of years old, her barn owl with a heart-shaped face able to go as far as he wanted without hurting her. The whole upside of having a witch mother was supposed to be that even if you were a son, therefore a regular human, she would always be there for you, unaging and strong. Itonus had burst into Dust when ushering Jonathan to safety. Karen Crane had died alone.

**

At first the doctors thought Gerald Crane had severed his son from his daemon, like he had so many others at their moment of peak terror, but Jonathan’s brain showed too much activity for the rare person who could survive such a despicable procedure. Even Gerald mercy killed the two people who had. 

The weeks ticked by, though, and his daemon did not return. Months passed and the scarecrow stopped being Jonathan’s every waking moment, shrinking to the corner of his eye and a shadow in his nightmares, but still she did not return. He spent a lot of his time in Arkham in solitary. The sight of a boy who could walk and talk fairly lucidly with no daemon beside him was enough to cause a riot among the general population. A girl would have been unnerving, but at least there would have been a reasonable potential explanation. 

Then, one night, when Jonathan was huddled in his favorite corner, there came a tapping from the air vent cover. The opening was very small, too small for a human even if Jonathan had the courage to try and the upper body strength for a pull-up. But the tapping continued, faster and faster.

The cover gave way with a clang. A ring of keys fell to the floor, and a bird fluttered down.

A crow. 

“You settled,” Jonathan said, inanely. He’d been teased a bit at school for not settling yet at fifteen.

“I’m so sorry,” she whispered, but then she was in his arms and trying to burrow into his chest. He wished he could fold her up and put her inside, like those fantasy novels he used to like where people’s daemons were invisible and internal. “I was so -”

“Scared, I know, I know, I would have gone after you…”

“I couldn’t, you've been locked up so tight…”

“How’d you get in?”

“I made friends with a girl who’s an expert burglar, hasn’t settled yet but likes cat forms, she’s squatting at our old house and I gave her some jewelry and stuff in exchange for intel, she’ll help us figure out what to do next, I don’t know what we’ll do, but…”

“I don’t care. You’re here, Pheobe.”

She shook her head. “Phobos. I’m Phobos now.”

Fitting. Jonathan nodded and placed her gently on his shoulder. He picked up the set of keys. “You got some idea how to get from here to an exit?”

“Selina researched the guard shifts, said right about now this hallway should be empty. You can actually unlock the doors from the inside in case orderlies lock themselves in by accident.”

Jonathan snorted, the closest thing to a laugh he’d done in a long time. “Typical.”

Phobos added dryly, “A laundry chute might be involved. Zany shenanigans.”

“God, I missed you.”

They were discovered in the laundry room, three guards advancing with stereotypical Rottweiler and pitbull daemons. Phobos whispered, “Put one of the pillowcases over your head.”

“What?”

“Just do it.”

So Jonathan grabbed a ragged, musty pillowcase from the pile and used one of the holes in it to see what was happening. Phobos launched herself in the air and did a weird sort of spin in midair. Dust fell from her wings, but not golden Dust, a sickly greenish Dust that settled like a cloud on their barriers to freedom. Who started to scream.

She cawed, “Now run! Don’t breathe it in!”

Jonathan could see the scarecrow from the corner of his eye, but he had Phobos with him, so everything was different now. He...he _was_ the scarecrow…

**

“Fasten your seatbelt because I’m going to speed like hell,” Selina said without introduction. Her daemon was in ocelot form on her lap. He yawned and stretched lazily even as she peeled towards a back road. “I heard back from Penguin, by the way, he’s interested in your party trick.”

“I didn’t know she could do that,” Jonathan said, petting Phobos’ ruffled feathers in wonder. Dad had injected him with a lot of harvested Dust from terrified victims, but he'd never expected it to have those kinds of side effects. “Who’s Penguin?”

“Mob boss. His daemon isn’t a penguin, though, it’s a kingfisher. Go figure. It’s good that you’ve got something he might want up his sleeve. You need protection unless you’re gonna go in hiding forever.”

“Guess so.” He found himself unable to care much beyond the immediate moment.

Phobos settled into Jonathan’s lap, face pressed against his torso to the point where her words were muffled. “Thank you, Selina. Thank you, Pallas.”

“You’re lucky my best friend growing up was a witch -”

“Her brothers treated her like shit for it,” Pallas interrupted.

“...Because otherwise Phobos would have freaked me out. She’s a good daemon. I hope you’re half as smart.” Selina prodded her daemon. “Sorry, Pallas got used to Phobos talking directly to us, since she didn’t really have a choice.”

“It’s cool. _A pallid bust of Pallas above my chamber door._ ”

“Wrong corvid, doofus,” Phobos said. “I’ll say _evermore_ instead.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Credit to irisbleufic for the concept of Harvey Bullock having a small terrier daemon, in private chat, as well as Oswald's kingfisher in the fic this is inspired by.
> 
> Mythology guide:
> 
> Phoebe = goddess associated with the Earth moon, mother of twins Artemis (goddess of the hunt), and Apollo (god of light, music, sports, and medicine).
> 
> Phobos = goddess of panic/fear, accompanied war god Ares into battle, one of the moons of the planet Mars, origin of _phobia_.
> 
> Eurydice = wife of Orpheus. He braved Hades to fetch her and bring her back to life, only to disobey orders and turn to look at her at the last minute, losing her all over again.
> 
> Itonus = famous worshipper of Athena, goddess of wisdom and righteous war/tactics.
> 
> Pallas = a mighty warrior who, in some traditions, was the father of moon goddess Selene. Also mentioned repeatedly in Edgar Allan Poe's "The Raven".


	2. Jonathan and Phobos (2/2)

Hugo Strange emerged from his morning shower to find Victor Zsasz was in living room, poking through his books. His daemon was lounging on Hugo’s couch. A lot of people referred to Zsasz’s equally famous Boudica as a wolf, but that wasn’t quite true. Hugo had done his homework on the daemons of any prominent Gothamite who might potentially end up under his care one day - Zsasz’s trophy-cutting compulsion and genial sociopathy would be fascinating to study. Boudica was a little smaller than a gray wolf, with a sharper face. A coywolf shape, half-wolf half-coyote. Betwixt and between. 

This was all more pleasant to muse upon when the two weren’t actually in his home, showing dominance. Without turning around, Zsasz said, “Oh hey, Professor Weird. Chillax. I’m just here for a chat.”

“How...interesting,” Hugo said, furtively reaching for a particular spot hidden behind wallpaper. Unlike him, Tin Hau was often sluggish in the mornings, but she was now a tightly coiled spring draped across his shoulders, ready to fling herself towards threats. 

Zsasz looked at him with a slight smirk. “I disabled your panic button. Panicking is not good for anybody. C’mon, have a seat.”

“Do you want me so close to you?” Tin Hau hissed at the smug coywolf. She’d never been as diplomatic as Hugo.

“No one has ever died instantly from snake bite,” Boudica said calmly. “Even the deadliest snake in China, Korea, and Japan - we do research too, you know. Bite me if you want to. Both of us can get a lot done in a few minutes.”

“Easy, Bou. Why does everyone assume the worse of me? Cool bathrobe, by the way, didn’t know you’d be into something that fuzzy.” Zsasz perched on the edge of an armchair with what was not a disarming grin. An arming grin, if anything. 

It had been a gift from Ms. Peabody, but that was beside the point. Hugo did not sit. “Speak your piece, then. Quickly. I don’t want to be late for work.”

“When you get to work, you’re gonna find out that Jonathan Crane’s escaped.” Zsasz made brief eye contact. Hugo did not give him the satisfaction of any expression of shock. “Penguin didn’t order him broken out, but he’s decided he wants the kid to stay free.”

“Why?”

“Dunno. I don’t ask these things. Maybe Penguin thinks he’s cute? He’s sixteen now; it’s legal in this state.” Zsasz took a sealed envelope from his pocket and waggled it. “This is a cover story for you to tell the GCPD if they come knocking. He’s doing you a favor. Now you don’t have to spend money feeding an extra mouth. Plus there was that guy who escaped a while back. The one electrocuting people. I bet you don’t want everyone to know you lost _another_ one.”

Hugo snatched it from Zsasz’s hand, tore it open, and checked to see that Oswald Cobblepot’s signature was at the bottom. “I don’t appreciate being ordered around by criminals the GCPD is too craven to arrest. Yet.”

Zsasz proudly bowed at that. “It’s an ‘or else’ kinda deal, etc. Have a nice day.”

It was not a nice day. Thankfully however, it took three whole days for the GCPD to send anyone, and by then Hugo was prepared to receive them. It was cliché to say that you could learn a lot about someone from their daemon, but it was cliché for a reason. 

Detective Jim Gordon, like most police officers, had a working domestic dog breed for a daemon. German Shepherds were well-suited for both military purposes and police work, as well as more peaceable occupations like search-and-rescue and guides for the disabled. If improperly socialized they could also be overprotective of their loved ones to the point of foolish, irrational behavior. Hugo had that last tidbit filed away for if he ever had to come in direct conflict with the man, rather than today’s careful maneuvering.

Dr. Leslie Thompkins, like the majority of those who grew up to be doctors, had a snake daemon. Hers was a small black and white snake. Unassuming. Unless you knew it was a king snake, non-venomous to humans but subsisting largely on other snakes, including rattlesnakes. Not to be trifled with. Also, she’d worked at Arkham for longer than Gordon ever had, and her knowledge was powerful. Hugo would have to be careful not to say anything she could catch as an uncharacteristic violation of standard procedure.

She was nothing but gracious to him as she explained her presence. “Ji - Detective Gordon thought he might interview some of the staff, if necessary, and I’m still on friendly terms with a few.”

“I didn’t make a lot of friends during my stint as security,” Gordon said, with the barest hint of dry humor. “To the best of your knowledge, how did Jonathan Crane escape?”

Here it was. “We did an internal investigation, and it turns out that ‘escape’ isn’t the right word. You are aware that Jonathan’s daemon somehow managed to fly away from him…”

He continued to spin the tale of a vengeful loved one of one of Gerald Crane’s victims finding and trapping Jonathan’s stray daemon, then paying off an orderly to help abduct him, presumably for some sort of horrible drawn-out fate. Using the promise of reunion with his daemon as a lure was an effort to make it seem like Jonathan had somehow done it on his own. Fortunately Arkham staff were able to uncover the conspiracy and quickly locate him.

“...And I have now certified that Jonathan’s remaining insanity was the result of being a non-witch living so far from his daemon for so long. The psychosis resulting from his father’s experimental treatment has been gone for some time now. Now that Jonathan’s been reunited with his daemon, his sanity has clearly improved enough to make it worth putting him in outpatient treatment on a trial basis. I will not be able to disclose his current whereabouts without a subpoena, but he’s being cared for and eased into eventual reintegration into society. He’s consented for me to play you a recording of his final diagnostic interview if you like.”

“Please do.” Gordon looked like he’d been stung by a bee but was trying not to show it. Either that or he was ready for lunchtime. The man had one of those faces that made it hard to tell. Thompkins was a picture of curiosity and compassion. 

Hugo pressed play. The interview had actually taken place in an anonymous office building, under the supervision of Zsasz and a silent girl with a daemon which kept cycling through various feline forms. The former was to keep Hugo from trying anything, and the girl and her daemon seemed to be there as a reassuring presence for Jonathan and his. Jonathan did come across as fully lucid, though traumatized, on the tape. He was showing more emotion and energy than he had during his entire stint in Gotham, not counting terror. He’d spent the entire interview awkwardly hugging his crow and sometimes letting her whisper into his ear. 

The tape contained one convenient lie, which was that his father had not only psychologically manipulated him into being an accessory to murder by intercision (and accomplice to milder offenses such as breaking and entering). Jonathan claimed his father had physically abused him as well, and burst into very realistic tears when recounting his father non-consensually touching Jonathan’s daemon on numerous occasions. Cobblepot was savvy enough to know that lunkheaded law enforcement would have limited sympathy for emotional abuse, but anyone short of a psychopath would pity a victim of such profound molestation. It wasn’t hard to believe of a man who’d been harvesting Dust from severed daemon bonds, and it was almost guaranteed to get Jonathan off the hook of any conventional jail time.

The tape also contained two inconvenient truths. Zsasz had mimed throat slitting when Hugo tried to contradict Jonathan, and there was no way for Hugo to edit the audio footage without suspicion.

Of course, Thompkins picked up on both. The moment the recording ended, she held up a hand. “Wait. He said, ‘both times I got to have therapy’. Both. Times. He only had therapy twice?”

“We concluded that it wasn’t doing much for his state of mind, and in fact was making him more agitated.” In truth, none of the therapists had wanted to work with him, and Jonathan had a tendency to shut down and just stare at the wall when anyone probed much into his emotions anyway.

Thompkins crossed her arms. “I find it hard to believe you couldn’t figure out something. Worse, he mentions spending the vast majority of his time alone. You took someone who was far away from his daemon for over a year, which would be painful even for a witch, and you isolated him _more_? Why, because he was unnerving?”

“Lee,” her daemon murmured.

Thompkins took a deep breath. “Right. This isn’t the time. I will be writing letters of complaint, though.”

Hugo smiled thinly. “Any further questions?”

Gordon exchanged brief glances with his daemon. She cocked her head to one side. Gordon looked up again and said, “About Jonathan, no. It’s good to hear he’s doing better. What happened to the conspirators in abducting him?”

Hugo’s smiled thinned further. “Regrettably, one was shot by the guards in the process of smuggling Jonathan out, and the other one fled the scene when we retrieved the boy.”

In reality, the one guard and two orderlies who’d tried to apprehend Jonathan said they couldn’t remember a thing other than intense terror. They’d said this after between ten to twenty hours of screaming, crying, and gibbering, respectively. There were no security cameras in the laundry room, which would soon be rectified, but this meant no footage of what exactly Jonathan or any of his helpers might have done. All of the staff had been sprinkled with a mysterious yellow-green Dust that had defied analysis so far. The two being kept in Indian Hill for observation seemed relatively stable now, if understandably perturbed by their situation. Hugo would dissect the third this afternoon.

Such a shame that young Mr. Crane hadn’t become truly interesting - rather than a pitiable object of mild curiosity - until he’d already slipped from their grasp. 

***

_Some time later…_

Pallas spotted Phobos flying overhead before Selina did. Ever since getting back to Jonathan, Phobos had started growing a single white feather on one wing, which corresponded with where Jonathan’s dad had stuck the syringe in him. Morbid. You had to know where to look, though. Being on the block where Jonathan lived these days made it easier to guess it was her, regardless.

At Pallas’ pointed meow, Phobos swooped down to perch on Selina’s shoulder. “I was just coming home from work. Are you two planning a visit? You haven’t seen my other half for, like, three months. Not since we were still unpacking.” They’d chatted with Phobos on her own a few times during those months.

“Been busy,” Selina said.

“I’ll tell him you’re coming.” She fluttered up to the bedroom window of Jonathan’s apartment, where he’d had a custom-made lever installed so she could let herself in once she undid the combination lock. 

“It’s so weird that she has a job and he doesn’t,” Pallas commented, running ahead.

It was a reasonably safe, clean building. Nothing fancy. Penguin had installed relocated Jonathan right at the center of the area Phobos was meant to cover, so most of the time she could do all her henchdaemon stuff with her human safe at home. Her range wasn’t infinite. Just huge. 

Jonathan buzzed them in the moment Selina pressed the button. When the elevator descended, a duo Selina recognized from Zsasz’s posse stepped out. They were dressed down in normal black clothes, not all fetish-y like when out for a kill, and one of them had a blue scarf.

The black woman and her African wild dog just brushed on past. The lean and pretty white boy with a tiny, big-eared fox on nestled in the crook of one arm, his right hand full of empty canvas grocery bags, paused and smiled at her. “Selina, right? Jonathan mentioned you.”

“Yeah,” Selina said, trying to remember if she’d seen this guy before.

“We check on him occasionally. Like, make sure he’s alive and he’s eating.” He lifted up the canvas bags for emphasis. “He’ll waste away if you leave him to his own devices.”

“Are you sure you’re an assassin?” Selina teased. She knew that since Zsasz didn’t always need backup, his people diversified into things like bodyguarding, too. Asset-minding wasn’t much of a stretch.

He grinned. “We also make sure he’s doing crime like he should.”

“It’s like being reverse parole officers,” said the fox daemon, before yawning.

“Shush, Safi. You’ll have to excuse her. She’s forgetting her manners because she’s exhausted from trying to keep up with our weirdo pack during a job earlier. I’m just the apprentice but sometimes they let me tag along.”

“KNIFEPOINT!” shouted the Zsaszette from just outside.

“That’s my cue.” He tipped an invisible hat at her before running off.

“Do we know anybody with normal daemons?” Pallas asked as he patrolled the borders of the elevator.

“The only weird thing about Themis is that she’s so much smaller than Bruce’s ego,” Selina sighed. You’d think he’d have a great horned owl or something, not a literal little owl.

Jonathan answered the door with Phobos literally stuffed down the front of his shirt, against his are bare skin and braced with his left hand. Selina supposed being super-clingy when they were together kept him from going nuts. Well, even more nuts. After a mumbled ‘hi’, Jonathan went back to drawing yet another scarecrow on a sheet of scrap paper at the dining table. Phobos had told Pallas that he ripped them up when he was done. This had to be a study break, because the table was covered in folders and notes and an open algebra textbook. Ugh. Better him than her.

“You’re being rude,” Phobos said, nudging Jonathan with her beak. “Pallas settled. Compliment him.”

He looked up. “Oh, hey, neat. A cat. Such a surprise. Sit, both of you, make yourselves at home.”

Pallas snorted and hopped up on one of the other three dining room chairs. “Sand cat. They eat vipers.”

“Mm, suits you.” He tried to go back to drawing, but Phobos outright pecked him. 

Selina sat on the chair that didn’t have a backpack on it. “How are you?”

Jonathan pondered this for way too long. “The employees of Mr. Cobblepot who pretend to be my foster parents took me to the DMV to get my drivers’ license. Not that I have a car, but it was nice of them. I’m sleeping better than last time I saw you. My Intro to Psych presentation went well and my partner asked me to go to a movie with her in celebration. I panicked and said I had a dentist appointment. Immediately.”

“Harley was just being friendly,” Phobos soothed.

“Her daemon hopped onto your back.”

“Arlecchino was just being excitable.”

Jonathan rolled his eyes. “He’s got poisonous mucus.”

“I think he’s sweet. He’s like mini frog-shape cherry and licorice gummy candy. What? You said I wasn’t allowed to talk about how cute Safi is, you didn’t say -”

Selina interrupted, “As heartwarming as this is, I have a favor to ask.”

“Go ahead,” Jonathan said quickly. 

“There’s a chick I’d like shadowed, when Phobos has the time.”

Phobos said, “I can only leave Jonathan when he’s not in public, so he doesn’t freak people out.”

“I get that. Just when you can. Name’s Silver St. Cloud, mink daemon, blonde, nose like she turned it up so hard it stuck…”

Jonathan raised an eyebrow. “Theo Galavan’s ward?”

“You know her?”

“I watch Galavan sometimes,” Phobos said. “I could keep an eye out for her in the process.”

“Not sure we’re supposed to tell anyone that,” Jonathan said.

“They aren’t just anyone,” Phobos said. Jonathan shrugged and went back to his creepy-ass drawing. Selina got permission to raid his fridge and watch TV, Pallas purring in her lap.

“Oh, Phobos?” she asked when she got up to refill her glass of water.

“Yes?” Phobos was now pecking out some of Jonathan’s work for him on a clunky second-hand laptop while he finished up his algebra homework. 

“If you think it’s necessary, go full Fear Dust on Silver. You have my blessing.”

“Gratitude, even,” Pallas added. 

“It’s so nice to have such stable friends to balance me out,” Jonathan said dryly.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tin Hau is the name of the Queen of Heaven in Cantonese. Strange needed a daemon with a name as grandiose as his personality. Her actual species is known as a mamushi snake. It's definitely the deadliest snake in Japan, but perhaps not China; Boudica is glossing over details in order to be pithy.
> 
> Knifepoint, real name Nefyn Pontiac, is an OC who shows up in a lot of my fics. He is the POV character of fic 2 in this series.
> 
> This is a sand cat, _Felis margarita_ , [looking how Selina looked at Bruce when he trusted Silver over her.](https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Felis_margarita_10.jpg#/media/File:Felis_margarita_10.jpg)
> 
> Harleen Quinzel will likely not appear in this fic, but I had to give her a nod. This is not the first time I have made her school friends with a version of Jonathan; she is prominent in my Made to Measure 'verse. "Arlecchino" was the name of a proto-Harlequin character as the drama form was evolving. In this fic, Jonathan's feelings for her are platonic flailing, because he likes her but doesn't remember how to have friends, not like Phobos does. [This is the frog I envision.](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/3/36/Ranitomeya_reticulata.jpg/320px-Ranitomeya_reticulata.jpg)
> 
> It makes sense for Bruce to have a very small daemon that Batman could hide in a pouch. The little owl is associated with Athena, literally _Athene noctua_ , and is small enough to perch on your hand. It is also territorial. Themis is the Titaness of divine law, above and distinct from mortal laws.


	3. Ed and Desdemona

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> 5 Times Ed's Daemon Upset Others (+1 Time She Gladdened Them)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Desdemona, Eszter, Nestor, and Harvey Bullock's daemon Cara (not named here) are lifted with permission from "Gold Dust". 
> 
> Note that some content tags have been added to the fic. This chapter also has a very brief reference to prescription drug abuse.
> 
> Fun facts: Ravens have been observed pulling on the tails of wolves and eagles just to manipulate them into playing tag. Also fashioning their own toys out of twigs. Also rolling down snowbanks or snow-covered car windshields.

1.

When Eddie Nashton was ten years old, his daemon literally turned into an elephant in the living room. That didn’t last long, and it didn’t go well. Father wasn’t amused. Zenocrate had nipped at her trunk, and the nip of a Weimaraner was not a fun thing. 

Afterwards, in their bedroom, she turned into a squirrel monkey with dextrous little paws - and a slightly tender nose - in order to apply soothing salve on Eddie’s back as he lay face-down. Mother had not intervened during the punishment itself, possibly because she didn’t want to get caught in a crossfire, possibly because she’d taken slightly more benzos than her psychiatrist said she was supposed to. Again. She was very far away when she did that. Afterwards Lysander had slipped under the locked door, though, pushing a near-flat tube of ointment through the gap using all his strength. (Funny that a delicate moth with beautiful green wings was the best parent in this household.)

“I’m really sorry,” Desdemona said quietly.

Eddie just sounded tired. “I know. You got mad.”

“Father shouldn’t have been yelling at you like that.” It just wasn’t fair. Father and Zenocrate was not so terrible as to physically punish a daemon systematically, far worse than hitting a human child. However, that meant Desdemona regularly feeling guilty about Eddie taking the majority of penalties for her actions. 

“Mm.”

“When we grow up, let’s change our last name and never ever come back to this house.”

“This house with a new hole in the floor,” Eddie said. His wry tone was reassuring, showing that he wasn’t really angry with her. 

When she was done with first aid, she turned into a big fluffy sheepdog mix to cuddle and protect him. “I’ll settle as something more convenient, promise.” Then she lay down and licked his cheek.

2.

 _Edward Nygma_ , Ed’s shiny new employee badge said. He put it on with a proud smile, his new name a constant reminder of how far they’d come.

 _Corvus corax_. Father had not been thrilled that she’d settled as a bird, but Mother was having a rare _there_ day at the time and snapped that there was nothing shameful about her paternal great-great-grandmother being a witch and recessive genes expressing themselves, and that was enough of that. And she’d thrown a vase at her husband’s head, shocking Father enough with her assertiveness that it really was enough of that.

Desdemona liked being a raven. Riddle-associated. Clever. Small enough to perch on Ed’s shoulder or rest in his lap and thus get to stay with him on the bus instead of moving back to the oversize-daemon section, big enough to fight, omnivorous enough to eat a lot of different things if she felt in the mood to eat rather than let Ed take care of all that for the both of them. Oh, and the flying.

At first she followed along with Ed’s first day in the lab attentively. His chat with the Medical Examiner and his mimic glass lizard (like a snake but not, wow!) was interesting, even if the M.E. was a bit brusque and patronizing for her taste. Looking around the lab was also interesting, even if she wasn’t allowed to touch anything until they’d been here a few months and Ed thought they could get away with her handing him stuff. 

Then he started on a cartoonishly big stack of paperwork. She finished reading the book on the science and history of alethiometers Ed had brought in his satchel for her, large-print, not because of her eyesight but because that way she could easily stand on top of it and turn the pages with her beak. They got to see one as part of a special museum exhibit once, and she'd whispered in his ear that they totally should have stolen it, that it would have been SO worth it if they could use it to learn everything about everything. But the book and its amusement was all done now.

“Need help?” she asked. He was very focused and just grunted and made a shoo-ing motion. So she went to go check out the rest of the precinct and see how far from Ed’s desk she could get by herself.

She made it to Captain Essen’s office but didn’t go in. Even if that had been polite, Desdemona could see she was busy talking to an cop of some kind, rank not yet certain, in a rumpled suit and fedora. Her black Labrador daemon was simultaneously in conference with what had to be the cop’s significantly smaller Irish terrier. Desdemona had mixed feelings about how dog-daemon-heavy the precinct was, but Captain Essen and Peleus had been very kind. She stayed on the floor and watched for a bit, interested in the dynamic. 

Then the door swung open. “Why’s a crow in here?” the cop exclaimed, making a shoo-ing motion that was less gracious than Ed’s.

“I’m a raven,” Desdemona replied, offended. This didn’t seem to help. His eyes went big.

Peleus came closer to her and said firmly, “You can’t wander around like this, Desdemona, you need to go back to your human.”

“My range is pretty big, actually -”

“No, what I mean is that you’ll upset people.”

“I thought that was just high school and college kids who were that squeamish,” she replied. In the background, Captain Essen snorted and smiled a bit, like she didn’t mean to.

“You’ve hired a freak to replace that idiot, then?” the cop asked. 

She facepalmed. “Don’t make me sign you up for another sensitivity seminar, Bullock.”

“Fine, toodle-oo,” Desdemona said in the most passive-aggressive way possible. She ended up taking a nap in Ed’s desk drawer until something interesting happened. He let her line it with his scarf.

3.

“Does it strike you as weird at all that Miss Kringle has a lepidopteran daemon and Dougherty has a big ol’ hunting dog?” Desdemona asked. She liked Miss Kringle and thought Nestor was a very pretty butterfly, if super timid, but she wasn’t sure Ed knew whether he was in love or just in longing. 

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” They’d been parked across the street from Miss Kringle’s apartment for twenty-seven minutes now. 

She sang, “ _I have a very complex complex, my name appears on Freud’s index because I love my mother._ Who am I?”

“Miss Kringle is in danger and you’re butchering Tom Lehrer lyrics?” Ed drummed his fingers on the steering wheel. “I should have brought binoculars.”

“If you’d just let me get a closer look -”

“One or both of them will see you, and they’ll know it’s you because of our reputation.”

Dougherty caught onto them anyway and started beating up Ed. No elephants this time. Stupid pointer dogs and their stupid generations of specifically being bred to hunt birds. Stupid hunting dogs that hunt birds and hate birds and sweet green moths - no, red butterflies, butterfly, that’s what he was, clear your mind - that say they care about you but they let themselves get hurt and they let you get hurt and think you can get away with this thinking you can be unrepentant and everybody knows and nobody cares and _I have a gun and a badge and deserve to go to hell WHO AM I?_

Later, Desdemona wasn’t sure whether she got Brownie’s eyes out before Ed was done stabbing Dougherty to death. It was a lot simpler to wash the Dust off her than the blood off him, though.

4.

Ed was frozen in shock. He hadn’t had his hands around Kristen’s throat long enough to kill her unless she had some sort of condition, perhaps. Enough for her to be unconscious, perhaps. Then he slowly turned around.

“Your beak.”

She shivered and croaked and spat frantically. Dust was not something meant to be tasted, she thought, bitter and gritty. “We’re a team, Ed. You grabbed her, I grabbed him. I tried to be careful. I tried - butterflies are so fragile, Ed, Eddie buddy, are you mad?”

He threw a drinking glass at her and it shattered against the wall. As he held Kristen and sobbed, she hid under the dining table, unable to watch.

Then all of a sudden he got up and cleared his throat, letting Kristen’s upper body and head drop with an audible ‘clonk’. “Dez! We’ve got work to do! Come on out, don’t be shy. There’s a whole scavenger hunt to plan for him.”

She peeked out. “What?”

He was smiling, but there was a sharklike element to it, and he was far too bouncy as he ran around putting clothes on. “Tempus fugit, Daughter of Odin!”

“You’re not Ed.” He hated anyone calling her Dez.

“Course I am, who else would I be?” He patted his shoulder. “Hop on board, help me brainstorm.”

She was more afraid of this human than she’d ever been of Tom Dougherty (rest in pieces). “No. Either you’re not Ed, or you’re an Ed that’s got something so wrong with him that you shouldn’t be allowed anywhere.”

“What has two wings and better get with the program?” Then he tried to grab her. 

Ed had installed one of those latches on the window that allowed hand-less daemons to let themselves out, so she quickly exited and flew a specific spot on the roof of the building across from them. They’d done experiments and she knew that as long as she stayed there, he would be unable to leave the apartment. Better to brave the rain than whatever that was.

Eventually she put two and two together and realized that the phantom version of himself Ed had been arguing with lately, which he'd described to her but she had never seen or heard herself, had taken over. Hopefully not for long. She felt that alien, sociopathic anger of not-Ed for a long time, and didn’t venture back until she felt him falling asleep.

5.

Poor Ed, taking care of a fussy wounded mob boss all night. He wasn’t quite asleep on top of the covers, carefully not touching Oswald Cobblepot, but he was drowsy and out of it. Eszter was snoozing next to her human’s head in a nest made out of some old handkerchiefs that Ed used for cleaning the more delicate pretty things in Desdemona’s collection. Lucky that the Penguin did not actually have a penguin daemon. A black and white kingfisher with sort of a penguin aesthetic took up far less room.

There was a tapping noise and Ed lifted his head. “S’real?” 

They’d learned that while Ed had suffered a wee bit of a psychotic break, Desdemona had not, so she’d become his first line of defense in these matters. He’d praised her actions in grounding his “possessed” self and not letting him do who-knows-what with Miss Kringle’s body. They’d chosen to bury her rather than dissolve and crush her, though, and painted a red butterfly on a smooth river stone to represent Nestor since they couldn’t do the real amulet thing. Desdemona kept watch and chased off a hunter who might otherwise have stumbled upon Ed filling in the grave. 

She’d never be able to stop that Other Ed from showing up and harassing him, but she could provide a counterbalance. If Ed had discovered he liked torturing someone else’s minions now, that was fine, she just wanted him to be safe about it. She’d never cared about right and wrong the way he had. She cared about whether her human was happy. 

Case in point, Ed was far too tired and comfortable to be made to get up, so she said, “Yes, but I’ll deal with it.”

“Mm.”

There was a tapping that so gently came rapping, rapping upon their chamber door. She was glad to be on this side of the window, though. 

At first she thought it really was a raven trying to get in, and almost laughed, but she realized it was too small and its beak was too straight. A crow. She chased it off with considerable glee.

The next day, Eszter sidled up to Desdemona while their humans were arguing about where to put the rest of what was once Mr. Leonard. “Oswald probably doesn’t want me telling you this, but if you meet a crow daemon that doesn’t have a human anywhere in sight, she’s probably an ally we could really use right about now. It'll make the attack on Galavan much easier.”

“Oh dear,” Desdemona said quietly.

(+1)

Oswald shook Ed’s hand longer than Ed usually liked shaking hands with anyone, but Ed didn’t seem displeased. “Thank you for your help, Edward -”

“Ed.”

“You’ve been a literal lifesaver, and I’ll never forget it. I owe you a favor. Several.”

Ed smiled. There was a tightness to it despite its width and warmth. “Are you sure you’re ready to get back out there? You’re not quite healed yet.”

“I’m putting you in danger by staying here as long as I’m a wanted man.” Eszter looked droopy from her perch on his shoulder. Oswald absently smoothed down her feathers.

“I could help you cover it up, or, or frame someone?” That question mark. They loved question marks, both of them, but Desdemona did not love that question mark Ed had just used, not the quaver in it. 

Oswald shook his head. “You’ve done more than enough. Thank you, my friend.” Then he turned to go.

Desdemona squawked, “Wait! No! Stop!”

The human stopped. The daemon turned. The two birds shared a look of understanding.

“We want to be _more_ than friends,” Desdemona said, because if she didn’t she was going to hate herself forever. “Please don’t leave.”

“We don’t really want to leave,” Eszter said softly.

“Stay with us, then.” She fluttered to the floor and tugged at Oswald’s pant leg. “Please? Pretty please? Sugar on top?”

Eszter pointedly flew to perch on the backs of one of the chairs. The men made more confused, tentative eye contact. 

Oswald and Eszter did not leave that day, or the next day, or the next. Not until the day Ed and Desdemona did too.

Good birdie.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have my doubts about whether Ed spends enough time strangling Kristen onscreen for her to die of it, but I understand narrative convention. I thought I'd patch it up to my satisfaction while I was here.
> 
> Desdemona and Lysander are characters from Shakespeare plays, while Zenocrate is from a Marlowe play. The relevance of Peleus as a name will become more clear later.


	4. Jerome and Eris

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If you are upset by unusual cruelty to cockroaches, know that there's a bit of that. I mean there's cruelty to humans, too, but no more so than in canon.

The circus folk hired a tag-along tutor, who doubled as a ticket seller, for all their showbiz spawn they dragged around. It was the tutor, Miss Renault, who first expressed concern when Eris hadn’t settled yet at sixteen. Everyone else was used to everyone around here being weird, but the moment she said something about it, people started commenting on it. More than commenting. 

Unfortunate, how Miss Renault’s trailer caught fire soon afterwards. She survived, but was less pretty with all those burns. Everyone blamed it on her ex. That didn’t stop the commentary, but it was satisfying.

“I could be a monkey in public,” Eris suggested in their tiny room in the trailer. They talked to each other a lot when Mom was being a loud slut on the other side of the wall. Jerome was lying on his mattress, handling a roach Eris had caught for him in her current cat form. He’d put it back down in a sec to see how far it could get on just two mismatched legs and no wings. “The black and white ones that look like they’re wearing skull caps.”

“Capuchins. I’d rather we get flak than you have to pretend to settle,” Jerome muttered.

“I don’t mind. We’ll get away with more if people think we’re ‘emotionally mature and stable’. Also you can’t get a driver’s license until I have a consistent appearance for the photo.”

“Hm! You have a point. Can I put a little hat and jacket on you? Give you some tiny cymbals to play?”

She snorted. “Of course, meathead, that was a major reason for that decision.” Then she turned into one, grabbed Jerome’s nearly ready cockroach, and started eating it. He affectionately tweaked her tail. There were plenty more insects out there to mess with.

***

Detective Gordon, Dr. Thompkins, and Mr. Cicero all looked disturbed as hell when Jerome dropped the crying act and started laughing. That was nothing, though, to the look on Gordon’s and Thompkins’ faces when Eris changed from a monkey to a hyena, the better to join in. Jerome was fully onboard. There was no point in hiding anything anymore. 

Eeeeeeeeeeeeexcept it turned out that Eris gave Arkham the _willies_ , because each inmate’s containment protocols were calibrated for their daemon. Every inmate was at least sixteen years old (under eighteen there were more legal hoops to jump through, but there were special cases), and everyone else was settled. Daemon form affected cell size, strength of the cell door, amount of space under the cell door, whether your daemon got to stay right by you in group areas or had to stay in the containment cage nearby with the other big ones, and how they went about taking you down if you got rowdy. 

Dr. Strange told Jerome that he’d get a chance to let Eris continue to be herself unchecked, as long as she didn’t abuse the privilege. She could change form if she wanted, but not in a way that caused security risks or undue distress to the other “patients”. Hah, _patients_ , right. Strange was so full of his own shit that Jerome considered suggesting a good laxative he’d used a few times for pranks. 

This lasted a few months until another inmate attacked them with a food tray out of the blue, screeching that Jerome was an abomination and Eris SHOULD NOT BEEEEEEEEEEE. Eris turned into a queen bee - the kind that could sting multiple times - and flew down his shirt. This kicked off a riot that involved a gratifying amount of food fighting and bloody noses. Eris hit a personal record for transformations in less than fifteen minutes, spending about two seconds in each shape. Including a beluga whale flopping around.

Then Jerome got a needle jab. 

When he woke up, Eris was in a large Plexiglas box with a handle and a few tiny holes. She’d turned into a hornet angrily buzzing around to express her feelings. She took everything so seriously. Jerome was propped up in a (rather comfy) chair in Strange’s office, a burly orderly with a club in hand keeping watch. Strange was writing something in a notebook and looked up like he’d just noticed Jerome drop in. Jerome couldn’t hold back a chuckle. Strange’s snake daemon was basking under the desk lamp, close enough that Jerome could touch her if he leaned forward and reached, the novelty of which might almost be worth the fallout. 

Strange closed the notebook. “Let’s not think of this as a punishment. This is an opportunity. A chance for problem-solving. Perhaps this will encourage Eris to be less indecisive.”

“Maybe I’ll be the first daemon ever to figure out how to turn into a cloud of toxic _gas._ ” Eris spat out, switching to fat and toothy sewer rat. Strange paid her no attention. His daemon snorted, which made Jerome like her slightly more than he liked her human. 

“Can’t handle my uniqueness, huh?” Jerome asked, smirking.

Strange made a thoughtful “hmm” noise. “You remind me of another case. Actually, while the issues are not the same, I think you two might be good for each other. Have you heard about Jonathan Crane in Cell Block A? Different shift from yours, I believe, so you are unlikely to have met him.”

“The kid’s got enough misery without putting him with this guy,” one of the orderlies protested.

“We have regulations against nonviolent patients completely lacking social interaction with their peers,” Strange said. Like anyone here cared about that sort of thing. Nah, he probably wanted to mash the two problem children together and see what happened. “Despite his truly terrible affliction, Jonathan’s behavior has been without reproach.”

“What’s wrong with _his_ daemon?” Jerome asked, intrigued.

***

His new meal buddy Jonathan’s daemon was _gone_. It was bizarre and ridiculous, like him not having any head but still talking and eating somehow.

Ms. Peabody walked ahead of Jerome and his non-lethally armed escort and explained, “He indirectly assisted his father in several murders and intercisions in order to create an experimental drug to cure fear.”

 _“Severings?”_ Jerome clutched Eris’ box to his chest in rapture. That was the stuff of cheesy horror movies on late-night TV.

“Yes. He and his daemon aren’t actually severed. As a side effect of the drug, she fled and hasn’t come back. Crane’s quiet but lucid. His presence has caused several disturbances and we’ve had to pull him out of the general population for his own safety. Play nice and you won’t have to spend all your time alone.”

Jerome contemplated plucking the terrapin turtle as it poked its head out of Peabody’s lab coat and tossing it to see if it would splat. Eris turned into a marmoset and made a throat-slitting motion. He mouthed _buzzkill_. 

When they got there, Jonathan was already sitting in the neutral room, lockable but not anyone’s cell. There was a table and two chairs, and two trays exactly like they’d be getting at the mess hall right about now. Jonathan didn’t look like a serial killer’s assistant. He looked like someone a vampire had been steadily feeding off of for months and barely keeping alive for later. He was using his blunt spoon to feed himself tiny bites and didn’t look up when the door opened. 

“This is Jerome Valeska,” Ms. Peabody said. Jerome noticed her wince at the sight of him, wow. She was still trying to sound cordial. This was the second most entertaining thing that had happened since his arrival, after the riot of course.

Jonathan looked up for a moment. “And Eris. I was informed. Thank you.” Then he went back to his painfully careful eating.

They ended up being left alone in the room together. Jerome put Eris on the table, off to the side. “Where’s the security camera?” This was obviously a behavioral experiment. 

Jonathan pointed at the small hole in the ceiling. He didn’t look at Jerome. He looked at Eris.

“What?” she asked, turning into a deliberately unpleasant naked mole rat.

“Last time I saw Phoebe she hadn’t settled yet, either.”

“You’re sixteen?”

“Yes. You’re not afraid of me. Or disgusted.”

“No. Oooh, I’m moping, oooooooh, fear and tremble!”

Jonathan raised an eyebrow in what might have been a gesture of respect. Or might have been a twitch. 

After the novelty wore off, Jonathan got dull and Jerome felt a need to stir him up a bit. He threw an overcooked pea at him. Jonathan picked it up and handed it back. Jerome called him Jon and Johnny and John Jacob Jingleheimer Schmidt, nothing fun. He asked him about what helping out with severings was like, and that almost provoked something, but Jonathan sighed tiredly and said he’d never seen the procedures, just cleaned up afterwards and helped process the Dust. Which was a disappointment in and of itself.

“Was your mother a witch?” Eris asked.

He continued to be more interested in her than in Jerome (how rude). “Yes. The doctors think that’s how I survived. Phoebe is probably being a bird somewhere. I don’t really taste food or feel hungry - or in pain or hot or cold or happy or sad or anything - but I have to stay alive so she’ll stay alive long enough to come back. Doesn’t matter if I’m dead inside right now.”

Jonathan said it with such sincere, desperate confidence that Jerome laughed. “Why are you so sure? How d’ya know she ain’t gonna just _wander_ fun and fancy free, and leave you to _rot_ and maybe one day you’ll just _drop dead_ because something got her? I’ve known people whose daemons didn’t like ‘em but this takes the cake.”

“YOU DON’T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT!” Jonathan shouted, getting to his feet with his hands flat on the table. “We were afraid, more afraid than anybody has ever been in the history of ever, for longer than anybody ever, and she did what she had to do to stay sane. Nobody knows anything about that kind of fear. I wish they did!”

“I wouldn’t mind seeing that,” Jerome said after a pleased pause. Jonathan sat down again and didn’t finish his food. 

***

Poking at Jonathan in various, usually metaphorical, ways wasn’t the worst hobby to have in this place. Either Jonathan never protested to the staff or they didn’t care.

“Do you hate us?” Eris asked one evening. Jonathan just shrugged. They didn’t manage to get a rise out of him every time. It made it more rewarding when they did.

Then Jonathan got reunited with Phoebe in the middle of the night due to some complicated classified business. Apparently. And this meant he was all better now. Apparently. And as for his crimes, his 'sane' testimony 'proved' his dad _made_ him do everything, the poor innocent lamb. Ms. Peabody didn't seem pleased when she relayed the news.

“Damn, we’re going to be even more bored with him gone,” Jerome commented as he was scratching bawdy limericks underneath his bed using the snapped-off handle of a plastic spoon. Eris was being a firefly to improve the lighting. They’d had enough for now of Jerome making origami critters out of pages he’d torn from his copy of the Bible some God-botherers had distributed to all the inmates. 

“I could pretend to settle. Again.”

Jerome tapped on the side of her box. He missed touching her. “If you’re up for it. Do you have enough space to be a capuchin?” If you were stuck wearing the same outfit in public every day, might as well be a comfortable one.

“Not enough for a _happy_ capuchin, but it’s physically possible. We can harp on how cruel it is to keep me in here. Especially next time we see a shrink.” She demonstrated, all curled up with her nose less than an inch from one corner, and made a piteous noise. Jerome gave her a thumbs-up. 

It took a few weeks of Jerome hiding impatience and Eris putting herself through consistent discomfort, but then she was out of the box and in his arms and _good, so good to hold her tight_. 

“I can...hardly….breathe...” she gasped against his neck when they were back in their cell, holding onto him with all four limbs and her tail. 

“Too bad, babe.” How hard would he have to squeeze for her to pop? Had anyone ever died that way? 

She bit his ear hard enough to draw a few beads of blood, then turned into a vampire bat to lap them up. “Waste not.”

Jerome tossed her at the wall to see what she would do. Before impact, she became a hummingbird and swerved around to attack his face. He smacked her with a pillow so she turned into a rolled-up armadillo (haha) that bounced on their bunk, then became a snake (venom painful but not life-threatening) that tried to sink her fangs in his leg. And so on. Their favorite game together. “Waste not, want _everything_.” 

***

Arkham had both girls and boys, but fewer of the former, at least as much as Jerome had observed. Not that Jerome was super picky, preferences aside. A preference that totally ruled out potential chances for fun was a dumb preference.

But certainly, Arkham didn’t have a lot of _anybody_ who was so damn hot as the lady who’d just joined their motley crew of sorts. She was blonde, and she’d selected the optional skirted version of the uniform, and her damselfly daemon was flitting around sizing up everyone rather than just sitting on her. Lotta people said girls with harmless insect daemons were pushovers, but the way she shot him down when he first tried to flirt was glorious.

More glorious, though, came later, with the Galavans absolutely digging Eris’ unsettled state. She’d confirmed it for them when she turned into a bear and run right at them, yelling to let Jerome go. She took things soooo seriously. Good thing Jerome had called her off. 

Theo Galavan had a stoat - excuse me, _ermine_ , Mr. Fancypants - who never spoke to anyone, just whispered in Galavan’s ear. His sister had an all-black wasp that did a lot of whirling around Barbara Kean’s damselfly by the end of the first day. 

“Every stunt you pull, Jerome, will be even more disturbing to the general public if Eris is seen transforming as often as possible, as quickly as possible,” Galavan said during their private meeting as the other guys were screwing around with random weapons. “If I may ask, do you have any idea why she’s still unsettled at age nearly nineteen?”

Jerome beamed winsomely, Eris a praying mantis on his fingertip. “I like to think I never lost touch with my inner child.”

Galavan nodded approvingly. It was so nice to be appreciated for once.

Which made it extra galling, later, when Galavan stabbed him onstage at a charity event so he could play the hero. 

***

“The cult thinks you’re a Messianic superhuman,” Dr. Thompkins explained. She was very calm for a lady getting held at gunpoint by someone who’d been a corpse a few minutes ago. It wasn’t very funny, but Jerome could appreciate it. 

“It’s because of me, isn’t it?” Eris asked from over where she was roaming around looking at things. Raccoon form this time, still with dextrous hands. “Ooh, is this a postcard congratulating you on the birth of your baby? Yours and Jim Gordon’s? Adorable!”

Now a note of fear entered her voice. “Don’t.”

Jerome patted her cheek. “Tell me where my face is and anything else that might be useful. I’ll be on my way. No need for _detours_. Your address is _on the card_ , tsk tsk. You’re good together, but you gotta be naive together too?”

Eris duct taped Thompkins’ snake daemon to the table while Thompkins filled them in. “Do you really need to do that to Rinaldo?” she asked, sounding more curious than mad. Different from Essen, though both had metaphorical cojones for sure.

“It’s just entertaining,” Eris said. “I’ll leave his nose free. You’re welcome.”

“We gotta go, babe,” Jerome said. “Lots to do.”

***

Bruce Wayne was cuffed to a pole and about to get shot by a calamitous cannon cornucopia, his itty bitty owl grasped soundly in one of Eris’ current talons. She enjoyed the moment daemons went poof like popped balloons full of glitter.

Just when Jerome was about to light the fuse, absolutely everyone except him and Eris started either screaming or whimpering, curling up into fetal positions if they could, their daemons huddled against them. Bruce, stuck where he’d been shackled, was going for shivering and making pained sounds. How...restrained, hah. There was Dust falling on them from above, but a toxic-looking green Dust that shimmered like an oil slick. 

“There’s a crow up there,” Eris observed, letting the owl go. It didn’t seem likely to fly off, busy frozen with terror. Eris snatched the crow without much difficulty and brought it down for a more convenient conversation.

“You said everyone should do what they want,” the crow pointed out, not pointlessly struggling in the grip. 

“On the one hand, I’m irritated at you for derailing my plans. On the other hand,” Jerome made a sweeping gesture, “Variety is the spice of life. What’s _this_ about?”

“Wasn’t expecting you to not - I’m not sure if my human wants me to -”

He pulled out a knife and approached the crow. “Your human comes over and talks too, otherwise you die _slow_.”

“Wait!” 

A figure emerged from behind a pillaged cotton candy stand. It was dressed in rags and burlap, with a hood over its head. Jagged stitched mouth and two small eye holes. Like a _scare_ crow. How ironic. Or poetic. Or...analogous? Ms. Renault hadn’t been so good with the English Lit. 

“Give Eris a reason not to pull her apart piece by piece,” Jerome said pleasantly. He nudged a flailing and weeping cultist aside with his foot. He wanted some personal space, was that too much to ask?

The scarecrow took off its hood. “Old times’ sake?”

“Jon! I’m not sure about the eye makeup, but you’re looking better fed. Shorter hair suits ya.” Jerome didn’t consider him a friend, because he didn’t consider anybody a friend, but there _was_ something pleasing about seeing Jonathan Crane get off his sad ass and embrace his dark side. “Whatcha doing here?”

Since what happened to us, my daemon can make this…” he made his own sweeping gesture, “happen to people. The current dose is going to wear off in thirty minutes to two hours, depending on their health. We were curious to see what would happen on a large scale. Most of Gotham is poorly lit right now, and I wanted to be able to easily see results. Nothing personal. She’s refining her technique and there’s only so much practice she can get while staying under the radar.”

“We didn’t expect you to be totally immune,” Phoebe said. “Would you please let me up?”

Jerome chuckled. “I’ve never been afraid of _you_ , scaredy boy. She’s just a part of you that went AWOL.” 

“True, and you’re also reanimated,” Jonathan said. He cast a look at the daemons before facing Jerome again. “I disrupted your party out of scientific curiosity, and I get why you might not like that. Gordon and Wayne’s guardian and a lot of backup will be here very soon. If you let Phobos and me off the hook, we’ll distract them for you. Anyone who tries to follow you gets a dose. I'll leave the rescue teams alone, for practicality. We can have a mutual non-interference pact. You don’t come after us or reveal my identity. If someone tries to hire me to go after you, I'll tell them I can't because you're immune. I know you want to see what I can do. I’m interested in fear, and you cause plenty.”

Jonathan sure was chattier these days. “Hmm…”

“And I’ve just gotten into college to major in psychology, and wouldn’t it be _great_ if _I ran Arkham one day_? It’ll never happen if I’m dead or locked up.” 

It was Jonathan’s decent imitation of Jerome’s speech patterns that settled it. Eris was right on Jerome’s wavelength and released the crow. Jerome realized that Jonathan had called her _Phobos_ , not _Pheobe_. He’d come across that name when looking up _Eris_ , and grinned. “Okay, yeah, that’d be a _scream_.”

Phobos flew to Jonathan, sitting rather than standing on his shoulder and nestling against his neck. “You should probably retreat. Fix your face properly.”

The staples did pinch a tad. “Told anyone about our past?”

“One. A friend of mine who finds you interesting. Not cultist-interesting, but she’s interested in how you think as a real human being. We’re both Psych majors. Leave her alone. She’s got a left shoulder blade tattoo that says _commedia darling_ -”

Jerome heard sirens. “Fine. FORM OF HORSE, MY DISCORDANT DEMOISELLE!” 

He rode his daemon into the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Barbara and Tabitha's daemons come from "Gold Dust". The others are mine. 
> 
> Stoats/Ermines were introduced to New Zealand to get rid of the pesky rabbits and now kill a lot of the birds. They are considered one of the worst of all invasive species. Their appearance and technically their name varies by time of year.
> 
> In the previous chapter I established that Captain Essen's daemon's name is Peleus. In mythology, Eris crashed his wedding and kicked off the Trojan War as a result of her introducing the Apple of Discord in the worst party game ever.
> 
> Has enough time passed for Jonathan to make up for all the high school he missed being either delirious or incarcerated? I honestly don't know. Gotham is nebulous with time. If it hasn't, let's say he took summer classes or something. 
> 
> Jonathan told Jerome about the tattoo rather than his friend's name, because you can check to see whether a woman of the correct age in your grasp has a specific tattoo, but it's not as easy to track her down sight unseen.


	5. Indian Hill Daemons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Dr. Hugo Strange's notes on the changes his subjects' daemons have gone through.
> 
> (Some implied medical horror/abuse, but some humor and comeuppance as well.)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The last daemon on the list came from irisbleufic's [Gold Dust](https://archiveofourown.org/works/12824994?view_full_work=true). The others are of my own devising.

Daemon Transformation Case Study 1

DAEMON: Carolus (or Charlie)

HUMAN: Alice Tetch

PREVIOUS FORM: Albino Eastern cottontail rabbit _(Sylvilagus floridanus)_.

CURRENT FORM: Albino Eastern cottontail rabbit with skin tumors characteristic of otherwise asymptomatic carriers of the myxoma virus. Cottontails are resistant to myxomatosis, a blood-borne disease which will generally cause other genuses of rabbit to die horribly within 2-14 days.

ADDITIONAL NOTES: Alice’s brother Jervis Tetch’s daemon, Tegan (or Tee), is an edible dormouse _(Glis glis)_ , a species known for spending 6 months or more per year in torpor. He reportedly keeps her in a top hat he wears. Given the rarity of a person being able to stay energetic with a deeply sleeping (as opposed to dozing) daemon, this suggests Alice’s accounts of her brother’s hypnotic ‘powers’ might not be entirely fanciful. A fascinating prospect. Would it be possible to bring Jervis into our care the next time he attempts to visit his sister, rather than sending him away again?

_RESPONSE FROM THE COURT OF OWLS: Absolutely not, Strange._

*

Daemon Transformation Case Study 2

DAEMON: Skadi 

HUMAN: Victor Fries

PREVIOUS FORM: Wood frog _(Rana sylvatica)_ , known for ability to freeze solid the entire winter and thaw in spring unharmed. In practice, was always animate and never frozen.

CURRENT FORM: Now has every appearance of being frozen, yet is fully animate and alert. Have been unable to persuade Fries to allow any truly thorough testing and have decided not to press the issue. 

ADDITIONAL NOTES: Fries’ interest in cryonics stems from childhood, which likely dictated the original form rather than being a total coincidence.

*

Daemon Transformation Case Study 3

DAEMON: Rosemary (Basil’s choice as of an hour ago)

HUMAN: Basil

PREVIOUS FORM: Unknown. 

CURRENT FORM: Unsettled. Upon Basil’s revival from a corpse, Rosemary materialized in the same manner as any newborn’s. With any luck, she will remain unsettled, in order to match her human’s shapeshifting talents.

ADDITIONAL NOTES: The name is a bit ‘cutesy’ for my taste, but it seems to have boosted their morale.

* 

Daemon Transformation Case Study 4

DAEMON: Feray

HUMAN: Bridgit Pike

PREVIOUS FORM: Unsettled, due to youth and normal emotional immaturity. Always avian, due to having a witch mother. 

CURRENT FORM: Black kite _(Milvus migrans)_. Settled when Pike regained consciousness after burn surgery. The black kite is a bird of prey known for being attracted to smoke and flame, where they seek out small animals fleeing the fire.

ADDITIONAL NOTES: While more straightforward, this is an interesting example of the degree to which a formative event can dictate daemon settling. Pike has not been forthcoming on how her mother came to name her daughter’s daemon after Ogou Feray, vodou fire deity whose iron skin covering protects him from harm. She will be more forthcoming soon. 

ADDENDUM: After successful memory wipe on Pike, Feray stopped talking.

_NOTE ADDED BY TIN HAU: After Pike recovered her memories, Feray proved exceedingly talkative, even vulgar. He also tried to eat Skadi during their confrontation with Fries. Also, Hugo’s an idiot. I’d elaborate, but do you know how hard it is to add notes when you don’t have limbs?_

_ADDITIONAL ADDENDUM: Please excuse my daemon’s lack of professionalism while I’m on morphine._

*

Daemon Transformation Case Study 5

DAEMON: Tezcatlipoca

HUMAN: Fish Mooney

PREVIOUS FORM: Jaguar _(Panthera onca)_.

CURRENT FORM: Jaguar _(Panthera onca)_.

_NOTE ADDED BY FISH : You’re one creepy son of a bitch, Strange._

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I headcanon that the aging-people dude ended up with a mayfly daemon, but I couldn't figure out where to put that in without breaking the flow. It's not just an herb joke - rosemary is associated with memory.
> 
> [ My new novel is available as ebook and print form on Amazon](https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07DSLT3D2/ref=mp_s_a_1_2?ie=UTF8&qid=1529183871&sr=8-2&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_FMwebp_QL65&keywords=Donaya+Haymond&dpPl=1&dpID=51cFXjiasBL&ref=plSrch), and in [print from the Barnes & Noble site.](https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/seasons-turning-donaya-haymond/1129067787?ean=9780999202654)


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